Zenith Birla(India)Limited

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Kolkata, Oct 13 (UNI) Zenith Birla(India)Limited, a member of the Rs 2300 crore Yash Birla Group, has embarked on a Rs 141 crore expansion cum diversification programme to capture a much wider export and domestic markets for steel pipes in diversified areas.

Elaborating his major business plans, including the capacity expansion programme, Chairman and Managing Director of Zenith Birla (India) Limited Yash Birla, the grand son of legendary B K Birla, here today said in order to increase the production capacity from the present 120,000 tonnes to 180,000 tonnes to meet the higher export target, they had decided to set up a state of the art manufacturing unit at Khopli ,near Navi Mumbai port, at acost of Rs 130 crores by March 2008.

To raise necessary funds for this purpose and meet a portion of the working capital requirement of Zenith Birla,the company had decided to go for a public issue of 2.28 million equity shares with a face value of Rs ten each for cash at a premium of Rs 45 per share for about a week from October 21, Mr Birla informed.

Asked about his targetted business growth in Zenith Birla branded API standard pipes, line pipes and merchanical pipes in the post expansion period when the company's installed capacity would be hiked by more than 60,000 tonnes per annum, Mr Birla said in the wake of tremendous growth opportunity in automotive and oil and natural gas sectors worldwide in the coming years, they had also decided to diversify their product ranges suitable for these two sectors and grab a portion of the fast expanding market worth more than 500 billion dollars a year.

"For this we have already set up two wholly owned subsidiaries of Zenith Birla in the USA and Dubai to exclusively cater to the American and the Gulf markets from where Zenith's volume of business had crossed the Rs 150 crore mark last year", Mr Birla informed.

He said his company also initiated fruitful dialogues with a number of leading auto manufacturers in the world, including those in the USA and Japan, to ensure that the volume of supply of Zenith steel pipes as one of the major components in the automobile sector was increased manifold.

Zenith was also exploring the possibility of making major dent in the supply of special steel pipes for the Oil and Natural gas sector both within the country and abroad and in the wake of their huge demand, the company Chairman said and hoped to double its business turnover from Rs 320 crores last year "as well as the profit margins'.

At present Zenith, which also produces machine tools, cutting tools and iron castings, has two plants at Aurangabad and Nashik in Maharashtra with a total workforce of over 1,000, Mr Birla informed.